Realm

New Beginnings

We finished scouring the basement, finding it occupied only by a cook and his two delinquent dishwashers. The next floor housed the mess hall and Tro discovered that the prisoners and all the higher ups were “upstairs in Romero’s study” and that Kraal Moot was with him. We hurried to the next floor only to find barracks, a library, and sleeping quarters for 60 or so men. While deciding what to do next, Rindil heard someone coming up the stairs. Rindil jumped him for more thoughal questioning.

With more clear directions, we found the prisoners, on the next floor. Gwen’s mother was shaken but otherwise unharmed, and told us it was too late to save her father. They were questioning another man now, we assume it is the watcher Nedavin mentioned. We rushed into the room to save him. Most of them gave us little trouble, and several ran, but Romero was a wererat and had a friend with exceptional fighting skills. Pietro and myself followed the ones who fled up the rope latter, and discovered flying canoes on the next floor.

Where oh where has my wererat gone!

Session 14

After defeating the snake and rescuing Pietro from its belly, we continue down the passage until we encounter two tunnels. One bares the symbol of the wererats and the other is partially blocked by fallen rumble. Wanting to avoid the wererats we decide to climb over the rubble. With Corbin leading the way, most of us climb through the rubble without much trouble. The tunnel leads to another tee junction where Corbin hears voices coming from one side of the passage. He dispels his light spell and we extinguish our torches. Just then Lady Gwenevere and Xaveak are attacked by some type of ooze. With the torches out most of us cannot see what’s happening. It takes a minute or so to get some torches lit so we can see what’s going on. Tro, Doug and Rindil proceed to attack the ooze with their torches and free Gwenevere and Xaveak.

After Gwenevere and Xaveak recover from the attack, we get ready to venture into the tunnel. Corbin and Rindil move to the edge of the tunnel just as two thief guild members show up. They approach our position but we quickly put out our torches and we go unnoticed. Corbin gives the signal to Rindil to attack and Rindil kills one of the thieves with an arrow to the head. Corbin moves to attack the remaining thief but he slips and falls to the ground. The thief attacks Corbin and spears him in the chest. Just then a creature attacks from the opposite side and tackles the thief into the darkness. Unable to see where the creature went, Rindil jumps down into the tunnel and waits under his cloak of invisibility. Lady Gwenevere moves to join the fight but slips and falls to the ground. Pietro moves into help and loses his footing but manages not to fall. Having killed the thief the creature lunges at us and narrowly misses Pietro and Rindil. Having lit a torch Tro is able to see what is going on and jumps off the rubble pile and pins the creature to the ground. With the creature now in the light we are able to see that it is a wererat. Before it can be questioned it throws Tro off of him and tries to run back down the tunnel; however, Rindil is ready with his bow and drops the creature with a single shot. We take a few minutes to examine the remains of the ooze, the wererat, and the two thieves. On the body of one of the thieves we find a key.

We regroup and head down the tunnel where the thieves came from only to encounter a lone thief looking for his colleagues. Pietro and Doug charge the thief and make short work of him; Doug kills him with a single crushing blow. We continue down the tunnel until we encounter a ladder heading up through a grate. We climb up and find ourselves in the washrooms of the thief’s guild. We head out into a set of hallways where there are several doors along each hallway. Pietro and Rindil sneak around listening to the doors for sounds of movement. Pietro hears someone snoring in one of the rooms. He sneaks into the person’s room and knocks him out with a solid hit from the hilt of his sword. The rest of the group moves into the hall as we try to determine our next move.

Circling the drain

We deposited our prisoner from the market incident in a nearby Inn, the others seem to think it an inconspicuous location. After questioning him, we disarmed, gaged and bound him with rope. After a brief discussion we decided to head to the busty wench to see what we can discover about Corbin’s letter.

We approached the situation rather tactfully. We skirted the market to avoid harassment by town guard. Tro watched the entrance for suspicious people in the street, while Pietro watched the back lane, all connected via message spells. This proved prudent as he forewarned us of men with bows on the roof-tops. Shortly after, Rindil saunters in and man with a urchin approach from another street. They exchange some words, after witch the man slits the boy’s throat. At this our roof-top watchers draw arrows.

Pietro is standing beside one as this happens, and tries to cut his bowstring while hiding under his cloak. The thief leader uses a smoke bomb, and Rindil charges in just as the child coughs. He grabs the boy and runs to find help, unaware that we are so close. Corbin sees and calls to Rindil, who shoves the kid into Corbins arms. Meanwhile, Tro has already joined the combat and is firing arrows at the men on the rooftops. I take cover behind a garbage bin and ask Momoa to scout the roof for danger. He finds something dangerous, but Pietro shoots it. Genevieve lets her chivalry show, drawing fire from the bowmen while shielding Corbin. Corbin enlarges her, and the last thief runs. Pietro hits him with a final arrow.

The injured bowmen lands on the ground in front of the inn. Corbin attempts, unsuccessfully, to convince the crowd the hurt thief was mugged. I cast a fortune Hex on him, and he convinces them just as the town guard arrive. While Corbin tells them it was a mugging, Tro pipes up that preventing these situations is the guards job, and Corbin is doing it for them. His guilt trip works a little too well, and the guard insist on helping Corbin, who asks that they take the injured kid (also “mugged”) to a church for medical attention. They take the kid, but leave a gaurd behind with Corbin. Gen tried to convince him that she will watch Corbin for him, but he’s reluctant. Pietro and I go a few blocks and I scream, to draw him away from the others. After this we are able to carry the thief up stairs and interrogate him.

It seems they were from the new, smaller thieves guild. Their leader, Romero (a.k.a. R), was hired by Vandar, and came up with the letter as a ploy to draw us into an ambush. There’s a reward for Corbin, though this thief was too low ranking to know any details. He doesn’t even know how many people are in this new thieves guild.

Out of character, we have a chance to ask as many questions as we want between sessions. The thief who got away was Varlock (name was mentioned in game). Nobody in the group of thieves we fought had black hand tattoos.

JP – Grabs a kid and gets a knife in the ribs for his efforts. Manages to keep an hand on him even after receiving the Winnipeg handshake.

Hits the child and makes arrangements to meet him in a bar later that evening.

JJ – tries to move through the crowd unnoticed, fails.

BJ – Moves towards – JO & D

- Fight -

JO – Sends D into the store and away from the attacker Suspicious dude springs into action, all of the others follow suit.

B – Tackles guy

X breaks B’s grapple but fails to break JO’s, losing his scalp in the process. B & R have sacks draped over their heads.

JO – Removed the arm of the only armed individual. B – heal checked the guy,

G – gets attacked with a club, saved. Removed the heads of three folks in one swing

JP – Shoots another person

JJ – Tackles another

The guards arrive

Gur pursues an assailant, loses them. JP follows on the roof tops. The two of them continue to follow. Lose them far away from the market. Abandons the effort and head to the meetup with “oliver”.

The rest dispersed with prisoners, question them and find that they are part of the “Ravens” who are obviously members of the Black Hand. Group decides to keep the prisoners for an extended period. Sets them up in an inn.

G waits inside, JP outside to meet with Varluck. Meets an underling, couldn’t intimidate a small kitten. The underling kills the messenger boy.

Out of the frying pan and into the fire

Standing nearly 11 feet tall, Rindil looks down upon the attacker that just tried to slice off a piece of him with his sword. His attacker did not look particularly fierce, well armored or even that knowledgeable on how to wield a sword. In a different situation Rindil may have hesitated but the night’s events have put him in a state where he was in no mood to talk. Having heard Tro’s door being kicked in he had gone to help out his friend but while battling the attackers he was somehow enlarged to twice his size. Thanks to his new size, and weight, he fell through the floor and nearly ended up in the basement. Having not seen Corbin cast this spell on him, he assumed that this was some joke played on him by the witch Shadow. Not willing to let Shadow’s prank get the better of him, he charged at the two swordsmen in front entrance and was met by two more attackers firing arrows at him from the dark. They weren’t particularly accurate but Rindil wasn’t about to take any chances. The man standing in front of him had already landed a lucky blow and seemed to be bolstered by this accomplishment. Rindil decided to end the fight quickly and with his increased size he brought a crashing blow down onto his attacker and fell him with a single blow. Rindil then threw his invisibility cloak over him and moved to find the archers in the dark.

Meanwhile back at the inn, Tro and Lady Gwenevere were in the basement of the inn along with the attacker that had kicked in Tro’s door and then fell through the hole left by Rindil. Lady Gwenevere checked the attacker’s health and determined that he was still alive. Corbin arrives shortly afterwards and ensure that the attacker is stabilised so that they can question him later. Lady Gwenevere runs up the stairs to see if she can find out what’s happened to the others in the group. She gets to the hall on the main level only to find that she’s on the wrong side of the hole in the floor. She sees Shadow looking down into the hole calling out to the others if they are okay. Just then the innkeeper tries to bolt out of the main lounge to get outside. Shadow spots him and runs after him. Lady Gwenevere decides that she needs to get to the other side and help Shadow and decides to jump across hole. She takes leaps across the hole only to land just short. She crashes onto the edge of the floor on the opposite side and begins to fall into the hold. The landing knocks the wind out of her but she manages to grab some boards to keep from falling into the hole.

Having already failed at crossing the hole, Tro decides not to try the same approach as Lady Gwenevere. Instead, he grabs some barrels and stacks them up so that Lady Gwenevere can get her footing and climb out of the hole. Tro and Corbin follow her out of the hole.

When the party last saw Pietro he was climbing out the second story window and heading to the roof to get a better view of what the party might be faced with. He sees some figures at the front of the inn and hears the sounds of a battle. In the back he sees four figures approaching the inn with torches. Hidden under his cloak of invisibility he fires an arrow at one of the figures. He hits and the figure yells in pain as he drops his torch on himself lighting his clothes on fire. The figure then runs off into the darkness yelling and trying to put out the fire. The other 3 figures approach the inn and move to the windows for the storage and kitchen. Pietro loses sight of them for a moment but then sees them run away from the building without their torches. Suspecting that the figures have set the building on fire, Pietro ties a rope to the inn’s chimney and climbs down to the ground. He finds that the kitchen and storage areas are indeed on fire. The building’s old dry wood is perfect fuel for the fire and it begins to spread quickly. Pietro calls out to anyone that can hear him that the building is on fire. He then jumps into the storage room and uses a barrel of water and his bedroll to put out the fire.

Back inside the inn Lady Gwenevere and Shadow have cornered the innkeeper and are questioning him. Shadow is doing her best to intimidate him to get him to explain what he knows about the attackers. The innkeeper confesses to being the one who organised the attack on the party. He says that he was approached by the thieves’ guild and told that if he found anyone carrying any unusual artifacts that they should be held for the guild and that there would be a large reward. The innkeeper claims that he was just trying to recover from the losses he suffered from the last time the Rindil caused problems at the inn. Looking around the inn and seeing the damage caused by Rindil during this stay, the two women feel that there may be some truth to his story. Lady Gwenevere tells the innkeeper that they will resolve this matter afterwards but first we need to put out the fire. She tells the innkeeper to lead them to the well so that they can put out the fire. They head out the front of the inn only to encounter Rindil. Rindil had just finished killing one of the archers and subduing the other when sees them. He hears that the innkeeper is responsible for the attack on the party and so he chases the innkeeper around the back of the inn. There he tackles him and threatens to tear him limb from limb if he doesn’t explain everything. However, the innkeeper is unable to offer any new information. Lady Gwenevere confronts Rindil and convinces him to not to kill the innkeeper and to help them put out the fire. Pietro, Shadow, Corbin, Lady Gwenevere and the inn keeper work quickly to carry water from the well to the inn and manage to put out the fire before it gets out of control.

While the rest of the party is working on the fire, Tro had traveled back upstairs to ensure that Corbin wasn’t still in his room. Corbin had run back to his room when he heard Pietro calling about the fire. Corbin raced to his room to gather his belongings and then jumped out the window to help the others fight the fire. Not realising that Corbin was already safely outside, Tro stood before the hole on the second floor calling out for Corbin. However, instead of finding Corbin, he found an old woman who was trapped on the wrong side of the hole in the floor. Tro tries to convince her to leave but she just returns to her room saying she can’t leave her “baby”. Tro tries to jump across the hole in the floor but doesn’t make it and ends up falling into the basement. Rindil was looking through the open window in Corbin’s room and saw Tro fall. Rindil lets the others know that Tro fell and then he heads around the front to see if he can get into the inn. Tro survives the fall but is rather frustrated and attacks the lone intruder still unconscious in the basement. Tro’s attack is a little stronger than he had intended and he “accidentally” kills the intruder. He then climbs out of the basement using the barrels he and the others had used before.

With Tro safe and the fire out, the rest of the party is able to help the old lady and her pet dog (her baby) out of her room, along with five or six trunks of possessions. The party tie up the innkeeper and the unconscious archer and rest in the inn for the night. The next morning they question both of their “prisoners” to try and gather additional information. They do not get any additional information and so they release the innkeeper and his accomplice and continue on their journey to the city of Blackwater.

On the way to the city, the party decides to enter separately so as not to draw too much attention. They also decide to hide the more noticeable gear that they collected from the ogre cave (e.g. Lady Gwenevere’s new armor). They agree to meet at Lady Gwenevere’s family home where they are able to meet her family and get a hot meal. Rindil, feeling overly cautious, decides not to enter the house and instead hides outside in his invisibility cloak eating his rations and trying to think up ways to get back at Shadow for making him fall through the floor of the inn. While traveling through the city the party notices that there are several flying ships docked over the city. One ship in particular stands out as it is clearly larger and more elegant then the others.

The party spend a few hours at Lady Gwenevere’s home eating, helping out around the house, and questioning her parents about everything they know about the watcher, the airships, and any strange events in the city. Lady Gwenevere’s parents are only able to offer a little bit of information and so after dinner the party leaves the house, split up and head to the market area.

Lady Gwenevere heads to the knight’s garrison and tries to gather information. All the knights can tell her is that someone with a name like Jar Cor Blackgrave (the watcher) probably lives in the dock area of the city.

Tro visits both of the local blacksmiths to try and get a new weapon made. He angers one of the blacksmiths, a half-orc, because he came to him after meeting with the dwarven smith.

Shadow tries to buy several very expensive books but Pietro talks her out of it as it would draw too much attention to her. Shadow is confused by this and questions what’s the point of having these coins (holding up her bag of gold) if she can’t spend them. Pietro tries to rush her out of the shop before she makes too much of a scene with her innocent but concerning questions.

A young peasant boy delivers a note to Corbin from an unknown individual that states he may be in danger and to meet him at a local bar (the lucky wench??). Afterwards Corbin notices that his coin purse was cut and all of his money is gone.

Rindil follows Lady Gwenevere around for a while but then spots two peasant boys robbing the citizens by cutting their coin purses and stealing their money. Rindil slips on his invisibility cloak and starts to follow one of the boys. He figures that the boys must be working for the local thieves’ guild. He figures that he can capture one and gain some information about the guild or follow him to their hideout.

BEWARE THE WRATH OF GIANTS

Well, we’ve finally made it out of the mansion and the swamp. We’re back among our friends in the caravan. Things should go back to normal now . . .

Shagdith asks our group to come together and tells us that we must all leave now. No explanation, just that we must leave.

I see Shadow say something to Pietro and then he wanders off.

Rindile and I go up to Shagdith and ask for our pay, 30 gold.

As we wander off we run into Pietro who tells us to go back and ask for double our pay. Wondering what Pietro is up to, we decide to do what he says. When we tell Shagdith that because of the abruptness of our leaving and the extra difficulty in the swamp that we require double pay he quickly agrees, saying “anything to be rid of you”.

Finding Pietro afterwards we ask him how he knew that Shagdith would pay up. Pietro says that he’ll tell us for 5 gold each. Curiosity getting the better of us Rindile and I agree. Pietro then shows us the box he found in Yarla’s coach containing a finger and a note to Shagdith.

As the caravan heads off we gather to decide where we should go. Shadow notices that one of the lights on her magic map, the nearest one, had gone out. We reach a consensus that we should make our way towards Blackwater and seek out the watcher Jar Cor Blackgrave.

We head East through the swamp with no problems and eventually leave the swamp behind. Around mid-day we smell smoke coming from the direction ahead of us. Rindile and Pietro volunteer to scout ahead and see if they can find the source of the smoke. In about an hour they report back.

As they lead us on, they describe the scene that they found. A camp in chaos, footprints of multiple sized everywhere, and trees uprooted and thrown around. Under one of the fallen trees they found a couple bodies with the invisibility cloaks that we have encountered before. Doug Brown, Corbin, Rindile and myself move the uprooted trunk off the unfortunate pair and find that these were members of the Black Hand.

Searching the bodies we find a note along with the cloaks. The note indicates that this group was to meet up with the caravan, ambush us, and return with Corbin (unharmed) to their main camp. This brings up a lot more questions for us.

Looking around we see a large path of destruction in the trees. Rindile takes a look and claims to see prints going in that direction of a giant, ogres, orcs, and something being dragged. After a brief discussion we decide not to go looking for trouble and to avoid this trail. We set off through the forest at an angle to the path of destruction.

After a few hours of traipsing through the forest we come out to a wide, well used path. Rindile checks the path and announces that there are ogre and giant tracks going towards the mountains along with some human looking tracks. No sign of any orc tracks though, or of anything being dragged.

Seeing as how we’ve crossed tracks twice now, it seems inevitable that we will run into these creatures at some point. Better to do it on our terms, rather than theirs. We decide to follow the tracks towards the mountains. Rindile and Pietro, with their magic cloaks, agree to scout ahead.

When they return they tell us of a cave with a giant chained up along one wall and a series of pens along the other wall with people in them. There is a long tunnel leading out of this room to a crossway guarded by 3 orcs.

We cautiously approach the cave when we hear the giant yell out, “who’s there. Show yourselves”.

We approach the giant and tell him that we come in peace. He lets us know that he is a prisoner of a pair of ogres and their servants, the orcs. He explains that one of the ogre’s is a magic user and controls him using a magic staff. He also says that, while he is a prisoner, he is also a guard, as he has been magically commanded to attack anyone opening the cages. We ask him if he would help us in exchange for retrieving the staff for him. He agrees.

Looking at the pens on the other side of the room, we see that the first one has a dead body in it. The second pen has 2 people in similar armor to the dead blackhand warriors that we encountered. The third pen has a single man sitting with his head lowered.

We question the 3rd man who says that he is a farmer from Westerfield. He and his son, the dead man, were making their way home from a trading trip when they were captured and imprisoned. Most of the other prisoners were taken down the tunnel and never seen again.

We quickly question the other 2 prisoners, noticing that they do have the hand tattoos of the Blackhand. The younger one has only been with the Blackhand a couple of weeks and doesn’t know very much. The other one is very tight-lipped.

We decide on a strategy to take out the orc’s guarding the cross-space. Rindle and Pietro go about ¾ down the tunnel with their cloaks on. Shadow and I hide down an extremely dark side tunnel, me with my crossbow ready. Doug Brown and Corbin are on the far side of the shadowy tunnel . DB calls out for assistance in Orcish, drawing the Orc’s, while pretending to grapple with Corbin. This puts the Orc’s in a potential 3-way ambush. All goes well as we start to ambush the Orc’s, when something attacks Shadow and myself from behind. I manage to dodge the attack, but Shadow is not so lucky. As Corbin and DB make short work of the Orc’s I suddenly find myself in the grip of a tentacle. I try to escape the tentacle, but am unable to. I see Shadow move back towards the main tunnel.

Shadow grabs a torch and lets DB and Corbin know what is happening. Soon the three are chasing me down the dark tunnel. I drop the crossbow and try to hit the tentacle with the club at my waist, to no effect. Corbin and DB attack and, while they do hit the creature, their attacks tend to bounce off the creature’s tough skin. As I try to break free of the creature’s grip, both DB and Corbin also become entangled in this creature’s tentacles. As we all struggle with the creature, I curse it, and suddenly we all break free. As I recover from being entangled, I see DB kill the creature in one stroke. As Shadow catches up to us with the torch, we see another body nearby. We search both bodies and find a ring and a short sword.

As we head back the way we came we run into Rindile who asks what happened. We bring Rindile up to date and then he and Pietro go invisible and sneak / reconnoiter down the hallway.
When we next hear from them they inform us that they found an eating area to the South with about 10 Orcs and another entrance at the far end of the room. They also let us know that they killed another Orc in the hallway.

We quickly come up with a plan: Rindile and Pietro will sneak into the eating area, DB will throw Corbin into the room, using the same trick from earlier, and Shadow and myself will follow everyone else in.

The plan goes well, the Orcs are confused by DB and Corbin’s attack. We make a quick end of the Orcs, only to notice that Rindile was not in the battle. We hurry down the far entrance to the room to find Rindile fighting a Troll. Seeing all of us the Troll pushes past us, only to be taken down by Shadow’s Weasel (carrying a spell). We decide to throw the Troll into the cooking fire.

We return down the tunnel, until we reach the cross tunnel. Rindile and Pietro scout the Northern tunnel and return to let us know that they have found a room with a sleaping Ogre. We all go to the entrance of the room and Rindile enters the room. After a few steps Rindile hears a click and realizes that he is standing on a trap trigger. Corbin sneaks into the room and Coup de Grace’s the sleeping Ogre. We try to move the Ogre’s bed onto the trap, with no success. We grab everything of value in the room, including the Ogre’s staff and leave the room with Rindile still on the trap. Rindle dives off the trap, onto the Ogre’s bed, as a loud alarm sounds.

The party heads back down the tunnel, running into a couple more Orcs. We quickly dispatch the Orcs, make it back to the main hallway and head back towards the entrance. We quickly discover another Ogre coming after us. Pietro and Shadow take the Ogre’s staff and run back towards the Giant while the rest of us slow down the Ogre. As we fight a loosing battle against the Ogre we hear a pounding coming from the tunnel behind us. All of a sudden Corbin is bowled over as the giant attacks the Ogre with the staff. When it is over the giant thanks us for freeing him and leaves, the Ogre dead and the staff destroyed.

We investigate the one tunnel that we have not had a chance to look in yet, and find the Ogre’s room. In it are a surprising amount of items, including large amounts of coins, mundane weapons, and a fairly large collection of magical items. With the defenders all dead, we decide to return to the prison area, interrogate the prisoners some more, and rest until tomorrow.

From Loot to Lousy

In typical adventure party fashion, we got down to business; Figuring out the loot. We spent some time reviewing the loot that we had collected, splitting coinage, and allocating items to the most appropriate members. After that was out of the way we spent some time questioning the captives. After we were done with them, we locked them back up in the cells with plenty of food and a promise to return for them. Unfortunately that promise was quit pointless as we left the cave a freak earthquake hits and the cave collapses most surely killing everyone inside. Bewildered by the earthquake, the party investigates the area looking for any changes our for a source of the quake. The only note we make is that there are no animal sounds. It seems very quiet. We head off for the direction of BlackWater when we come across a lone inn at a major crossroad of the highway. Rindil begins to act rather suspicious and decideds to camp out in a field while the rest of the party checks out the inn (rest of the party is unaware that he had an altercation in this inn before joining up with the group). The party speaks to the inn keeper and he appears to be rather excited that there are actual customers. We agree on splitting up the party into three rooms and when we pay the inn keeper appears to be shocked at the coins we are using. The party realizes that the coins have weird emblems on them and appear to be from somewhere else. The party dines then goes to bed. While this is occurring, Rindil is watching bouncer outside the inn and the front door. In the middle of the night the inn keeper comes out and speaks to the bouncer, immediately the bouncer heads off to town. Rindil sees this as his opportunity to sneak into the inn. He attempts to wake up Tro so that he can get into the room.
However Tro does not seem to wake and instead Guen comes out into the hall to see what all the noise is about. Unable to wake Tro, Rindil goes back with Guen to her room with Shadow.
Later in the night the characters hear the sounds of movement in the hallway. Suddenly Tro’s door is kicked open with a loud bang. Tro continues to sleep through this. However Rindil comes out to investigate. Rindil calls out to waken Tro and then proceeds to engage the enemy. They appear to be about 4 robbers. Rindil manages to take out one of the them right away. Guen runs out into the hall and knocks out one of the thugs. All this commotion has cause Pietro to start investigating. Woken by the noise, Corbin opens his door and casts enlarge on Rindil. The added girth on Rindil causes the floor to give way and he falls down a level catching himself before falling down into the basement. One of the thugs attempts to run out of Tro’s room and instead he falls down the hole that Rindil made falling to his possible death (way to go Rindil and Corbin team). Pietro notices that there are more figures outside holding torches and begins to fear that they may want to burn down the inn. Pietro climbs out the window and gets up onto the roof preparing his bow. Rindil smashes through the front door in a crouched position knocking over two of the thugs outside. Guen makes her way down the stairs and calls for the rest of the party members to follow. Corbin makes his way to the hole Rindil made, and climbs down the ledge and swings down to the main level. Tro attempts to walk around the hole but is sloppy and falls down to the basement. Tro lands next to the thug that had falled down the hole as that thug starts to get up. Rindil gets up and takes a monster swing decapitating one of the thugs that he had knocked over

We entered a domed circular room with beautiful artwork covering the walls. What a difference from the previous room. A surprise at every turn in this place. As we survey the animals decorating the walls it is obvious that they match the statues we are carrying and the previous statues as well. Following the pattern we each place a statue around the circle.

For fear of more traps or some other negative effect I volunteered to go first. I placed the elephant into its spot and stood amazed at the portal that opened on the wall. A lush forest and the symbol of Obad Hi as the cleric informs me. I felt refreshed, better that I had in days it seemed.

Each member of the party placed their statues in turn with similar effect.

As the last statue was placed we all took a step back. Thankfully only a wooden door appeared. Undoubtedly the next stage in this puzzle.

The portals intrigue me, but seem to be impenetrable. Rindil poked one with stick and it just bounced off.

I wait as Pietro checks for traps at the wooden door and then open it. We see 8 sarcophagi and thrown with corpse shackled to it. The corpse holds a quill to write and there are books and a small replica of the mansion next to it. Pietro carefully approaches the corpse checking for traps and wearing his invisibility cloak, a task he would later regret.

A ghost materializes in front of Pietro and tells a tale of how a previous group of Drow adventurers chained him. He had the last laugh though with the aid of some god. Though he says that he does not need to be freed he does seem stuck in this place. He continues to demand our magical items and we refuse, of course. This ghost needs stop harassing innocent travellers.

The sarcophagi burst open and Skeletons pop out, each with a different magical weapon. Shrapnel hits the party hard and Pietro goes down. I am lucky enough to dodge the shrapnel and look up to notice the ghost is sniffing the air. Strange. As Rindil kills a skeleton he shouts something about gems in the back of the sarcophagi but is too busy battling the next skeleton to investigate further.

More bad luck, Tro is struck and goes down, whittling our number to only 4. I am keeping an eye on the ghost as I attack another skeleton and am worried as he approaches Pietro laying prone on the ground. The ghost seems sniff out his magical items and drain them. What will he do when he is done with the items? I must try and protect Pietro. Maybe if we kill the ghost the skeletons will fall too. I run up to the ghost and notice a faint glow of a cord connecting the skeleton to the corpse as he drains another item.

I can’t seem to damage the ghost with my weapons and hacking at the corpse also does not slow him. Luckily Shadow has figured out that prying out out the gems kills the skeletons. Rindil and Corbin are busy fighting the skeletons and Shadow is working on the gems.
In hopes of finding some information that could help us against the ghost I quickly survey the items by the corpse. There is a book called the Haven that explains about the building we are now in and another book I can’;t seem to read. No help here either.

The skeletons on the ground begin to move. This can’t be good. Shadow is still removing gems and now Rindil is under attack from the ghost. While its attention is turned, I drag Pietro over to the cleric for healing. I hope it is not too late.

As the skeletons coalesces into one monster skeleton Corbin quickly makes Rindil’s weapon magical so he can fight the ghost. I pick up some magical javelins and throw one at the ghost then turn to fight the monster skeleton. Tro is too close, so I point him in the right direction and tell him to move quickly while I approach the skeleton. I have to give Shadow time to remove the gems and Rindil time to kill the ghost. The ghost is killed. Excellent! The skeletons keep going and they hit hard. Too hard.

……

I wake up back in the swamp where the mansion was. What the? The little replica of the house is left with a note from bacab that the house is a gift use it wisely. Later I learn that the ghost thought that if he could open the portals he could become a god. Vecna had tricked him though. He used to follow balcob.

I realize now how much we have come to depend on each other and how well our different skills work together. I am used to fighting along side other knights, but these new companions are proving themselves worthy allies. Hopefully we can save the caravan from this zombie infested swamp soon.

As we all woke and tended to the worse of our injuries, Tro begged for his weapons back. First he stabs Gueneviere in the back, then he asks us to arm him?!? In stead we armed him with a shield, I care for my life and well being too much to give him a sword. It seems the others agree, as no one backed him.

We left our refuge inside the head as well rested as we would get in this forsaken edifice, and searched the rooms behind the statue. As I suspected, they were some sort of control room. Gears could be seen everywhere, and the walls were lined with levers. On inspection, the letters bboocc had Symbols beside them. Pulling the levers b-o-c-c-o-b activated some mechanism, which contained a pendant with the gods symbol. Corbin says it is not a holy symbol, I’ll have to study this thing to figure out what it does. The room mirroring that one had broken levers in a language I can not read. It appears it also has symbols by boccob, but without knowing which letter is which I cannot spell his name. Corbin may have a spell that would help. We will try on our way out.

The corpse I found earlier proved interesting. He appears to have died quite some time ago, by mundane sword wound. Possibly from these fake skeletons Reglanon Farseer is so fond of. Our deceased friend carried a note. It reads :

Imran,
I’m sorry my wife is putting you thru this, but I am sure that if you return with the treasure you shall have Ala’s hand in marriage. These heirlooms provided will be of great help to you on your quest. I used these myself to win a great many battles. Breath and Life are truely dazzling, are they not? And Eel is freshly sharpened.
-Angus Softbottom

He carried an enchanted sword and a ring, and was missing one finger, which likely held the other ring.

As we had sufficiently searched everything here we continued down the path Corbin found under the mechanical head. At the bottom of the slide was a peculiar room with strange creatures, the likes of which none of us had ever seen. Black slugs coated with slime whipped tentacles arching with electricity. Watching their movements and a few educated guesses on our part showed that these creatures could not see. The floor of the room had several inches of water. As such, when the slugs flung their tentacles, they would shock the water and the lightning would split and hit all in the room. I had hoped I could find some small stones in the water to throw, as the creatures seemed to be able to sense when things moved in the water, but all I could find were animal statues, a foot in hight, and carved of solid stone.
There was also strange pillars. The pillars shot darts, and would then rotate to face a new direction. While the others bravely fought the lightning slugs, I avoided the creatures by climbing the dart pillars. On the top of the pillars were reliefs of animals carved into the stone. As we inspected more statues and more pillars, we found that they matched, though there were several extra statues.

I was able to place the first statue on a pillar just as the others defeated the second slug. Matching the pieces gave bonuses like their animal counter part, owl’s wisdom or bulls strength, while being hit by darts gave penalties. The first I placed was owl. Corbin took the eagle, Tro bear, Rindil the cat, Genevieve bull, and Pietro placed the fox motif. Placing the last motif raised the portcullis blocking the next room.